AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Comparison

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 and AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT occupy opposite ends of the GPU spectrum, with the former representing a flagship Ada Lovelace part and the latter a compact RDNA 1.0 workstation chip. The benchmark data shows a decisive performance gap, but the comparison is not without nuance: the Radeon Pro 5500 XT remains competitive in its percentile ranking despite the massive absolute score differences.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head results are lopsided, with the RTX 4080 winning both shared tests by enormous margins. In Geekbench OpenCL, the RTX 4080 scores 214,739 against 41,772 for the Radeon Pro 5500 XT, a delta of 414.1%. The Vulkan test is even more extreme: the RTX 4080 posts 263,779 versus 39,601, representing a 566.1% advantage. These are not incremental gains; they reflect a generational chasm in raw compute throughput.

The Radeon Pro 5500 XT’s best showing comes in Geekbench Metal, where it scores 54,779, but the RTX 4080 has no comparable Metal result in the data, so no direct head-to-head exists there. In the broader benchmark suite, the RTX 4080’s Passmark G3D score of 34,457 dwarfs any single result from the AMD card, while its GPU Compute score of 20,671 further underscores the compute divide. The RTX 4080 also delivers 48.74 TFLOPS FP32 performance, which is roughly nine times the 5.398 TFLOPS of the Radeon Pro 5500 XT.

The delta percentages tell the story: the RTX 4080 is not merely faster; it is in a different performance class. Its average benchmark score of 54,247 places it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs, whereas the Radeon Pro 5500 XT’s average of 45,384 lands in the 84th percentile. Despite the massive score gap, both cards sit within two percentile points of each other, confirming that the AMD card is still a capable performer relative to the broader GPU landscape.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has the higher average benchmark score?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 leads with an average benchmark score of 54,247, compared to 45,384 for the AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT, a difference of roughly 19.5%.

Q: How much faster is the RTX 4080 in Geekbench Vulkan?

A: The RTX 4080 scores 263,779 in Vulkan, which is 566.1% higher than the Radeon Pro 5500 XT’s 39,601, making it the largest relative win in the head-to-head data.

Q: Does the Radeon Pro 5500 XT win any shared benchmark?

A: No. The head-to-head data shows the RTX 4080 winning both Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan tests, with the Radeon Pro 5500 XT recording zero wins in shared benchmarks.

Q: What is the percentile ranking difference between the two cards?

A: The RTX 4080 sits in the 86th percentile of all GPUs, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT is in the 84th percentile, despite the former having an average score nearly 9,000 points higher.

Q: Which card has a higher transistor density?

A: The RTX 4080 has a transistor density of 121.1M per mm², while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has 40.5M per mm², reflecting the RTX 4080’s more advanced 5 nm process node.

Q: Are there benchmark tests where only one card has data?

A: Yes. The RTX 4080 has results for 3DMark Steel Nomad, Passmark DirectX 9/10/11/12, G2D, G3D, and GPU Compute, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has a Geekbench Metal score that the RTX 4080 lacks.

Where Each One Wins

The RTX 4080 wins decisively in every measurable shared workload. Its 48.74 TFLOPS FP32 rating and 716.8 GB/s memory bandwidth make it a brute-force compute solution, evidenced by the 414.1% OpenCL and 566.1% Vulkan leads. The 16 GB GDDR6X frame buffer, paired with a 256-bit bus, provides massive headroom for large datasets and high-resolution textures, which is reflected in its 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 6,567.

The Radeon Pro 5500 XT wins in efficiency-focused scenarios, though no direct efficiency benchmark exists in the data. Its 125 W TDP is far lower than the RTX 4080’s 320 W, and its IGP slot width and lack of power connectors make it suitable for compact systems where the triple-slot RTX 4080 cannot physically fit. The AMD card’s 8 GB GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus is modest, but its 10.80 TFLOPS FP16 performance (2:1 ratio) indicates it can handle mixed-precision tasks reasonably well for its class.

For users prioritizing raw performance, the RTX 4080 is the obvious choice. For those constrained by physical space or power delivery, the Radeon Pro 5500 XT’s IGP form factor and 300 W suggested PSU requirement offer a viable alternative, albeit with drastically lower compute throughput.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ on nearly every core specification. The RTX 4080 uses a 5 nm process with 45,900 million transistors on a 379 mm² die, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT uses a 7 nm process with 6,400 million transistors on a 158 mm² die. The RTX 4080 has 9,728 shading units, 304 TMUs, and 112 ROPs, versus 1,536 shading units, 96 TMUs, and 32 ROPs for the AMD card. The RTX 4080 also includes 76 RT cores and 304 tensor cores, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has none.

Memory configurations are starkly different: the RTX 4080 offers 16 GB GDDR6X with 716.8 GB/s bandwidth, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has 8 GB GDDR6 with 224.0 GB/s bandwidth. Clock speeds favor the RTX 4080 at 2205 MHz base and 2505 MHz boost, versus 1187 MHz base and 1757 MHz boost for the AMD card. The RTX 4080’s pixel rate is 280.6 GPixel/s and texture rate is 761.5 GTexel/s, compared to 56.22 GPixel/s and 168.7 GTexel/s, respectively.

Physical and power specifications diverge completely. The RTX 4080 is a triple-slot card with a 1x 16-pin connector and 700 W suggested PSU, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT is an IGP with no power connectors and a 300 W suggested PSU. The RTX 4080 uses PCIe 4.0 x16 and has display outputs (1x HDMI 2.1, 3x DisplayPort 1.4a), while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT uses PCIe 4.0 x8 and has no outputs. The RTX 4080 measures 310 mm in length, 140 mm in height, and 61 mm in width; the AMD card has no listed dimensions.

Architecture Differences

The architectural divide is fundamental. The RTX 4080 is built on Ada Lovelace, NVIDIA’s generation for the GeForce 40 series, fabricated by TSMC on a 5 nm node. It introduces dedicated RT cores and tensor cores, enabling hardware-accelerated ray tracing and AI workloads, plus DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) support. The Radeon Pro 5500 XT uses RDNA 1.0, AMD’s first-generation RDNA architecture, on a 7 nm node, with no RT or tensor cores and DirectX 12 (12_1) support.

The RTX 4080’s FP32 and FP16 performance are identical at 48.74 TFLOPS, indicating a 1:1 ratio, whereas the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has a 2:1 FP16 ratio (10.80 TFLOPS FP16 versus 5.398 TFLOPS FP32). The RTX 4080’s memory subsystem is also architecturally superior: GDDR6X with 22.4 Gbps effective speed versus GDDR6 at 14 Gbps effective. Both cards support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4, but the RTX 4080’s 12 Ultimate feature set goes beyond the AMD card’s 12_1.

The RTX 4080 was released on 2022-09-19, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT launched on 2020-08-03, a two-year gap that explains the process node and feature differences. The RTX 4080 has a launch MSRP of 1,199 USD, while the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has no listed launch MSRP. Both cards are end-of-life, but the RTX 4080 has a documented predecessor (GeForce 30) and successor (GeForce 50), whereas the Radeon Pro 5500 XT has neither. The transistor density difference—121.1M / mm² versus 40.5M / mm²—is a direct result of the 5 nm versus 7 nm manufacturing process, making the RTX 4080 a denser, more advanced design by every architectural metric.